


n00b

by GhostofBambi



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Gamers, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Emails, Online Gaming, Texting
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-11
Updated: 2019-07-18
Packaged: 2020-06-03 15:45:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,018
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19467118
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GhostofBambi/pseuds/GhostofBambi
Summary: James Potter, one of the best players of his favourite online game, Wizarding World Wars, is on top of the world in his role as leader of his gaming group, that is, until the arrival of a new, mysterious player who is far too adept at trash talk, and throws his entire life completely off balance.





	1. Tutorial

**Author's Note:**

> God knows the damage I'm going to do to my sanity working towards weekly updates, but I did this to myself. Have at the prologue.

**From:** James Potter (carelesswhiska@gmail.com)

 **To:** Sirius Black (fyodoraboutit@hotmail.com), Remus Lupin (rjlupin2001@gmail.com), Peter Pettigrew (badboyzbadpete@yahoo.com)

 **Date:** 20th June, 2019, 7:22 p.m.

 **Subject:** petition for the expulsion of jackedripper666 from the marauders alliance

====================

hi mates,

it is i, james lancelot potter, your fearless leader and devoted friend. please do not all faint at once.

further to our conversation of saturday 15th june 2019, vis-a-vis jackedripper666, otherwise known as charles, i formally extend my reasoning as to why we need to expel him from the party asap.

  * he keeps asking us how we all feel about our credit scores
  * subscribed his ex girlfriend to the kkk newsletter because she looked at him funny in asda living
  * he prefers the friends spinoff show joey to friends
  * i'm sick of him following every mission up with long winded criticisms that somehow exclude him every time
  * ditto his stupid feedback emails
  * i'm sick of him signing off his stupid feedback emails with "kindest regards, charles barnabas fernsby"
  * i doubt that's even his real name
  * i legitimately thought that clint foxworthy was a real person for an entire month when he announced his death
  * and would like to take this moment to remind you all that clint foxworthy was a HOUSEPLANT he stopped watering to "teach it some manners"
  * is nobody else freaked out by the story of how he consumed an alarmingly large bag of cocaine and that's apparently how he "got into cycling in a big way"???
  * thinks strawberry jam is "condescending"???
  * his life's ambition is to purchase a bowling alley and allow entrance only to people who take the sport seriously — no parties or families, no side bars, no tattooed patrons (sirius, are you not offended??)
  * "as i watched my cat relax, i wondered how it might feel to be responsible" this line alone should have been expulsion-worthy in itself imo
  * am sick of him calling me jim bob



if we can all (sirius) just agree (sirius) to expel him from the party i truly believe that it would be conducive to a more positive gaming experience in the sense that we can all stop worrying that he'll turn up at our homes with one of his many katanas and wear our intestines as fetching winter scarves.

i eagerly await your agreement.

jp

*****

**WhatsApp Group:** Tits out 4 Sooty & Sweep

 **Members:** Sirius Black, Remus Lupin, Peter Pettigrew, James Potter

 **Chat Resumed:** 20th June, 2019, 8:14 p.m.

====================

 **Sirius:** You fucking pompous twat

 **Peter:** ????

 **Sirius:** I meant James, not you

 **James:** wtf did i do????

 **Sirius:** Have you read his email yet, Pete?

 **Peter:** No??  
I'll read it now brb

 **Sirius:** The fucking hypocrisy  
As if Lancelot's even your real middle name  
I know it isn't, I know you're lying

 **James:** prove it isn't.

 **Sirius:** I fucking will if it kills me

 **James:** my mum and dad swore on pain of death to keep that to themselves so good luck, yeah?

 **Sirius:** So I'll find it another way  
Passport, electoral roll, I've got options

 **James:** can't find me on the electoral roll if i never register to vote.

 **Remus:** You haven't registered to vote yet?

 **Sirius:** LMFAO caught out

 **James:** i'd meant to get round to it.

 **Remus:** You've been eighteen for three months!  
We had European Parliament elections in May!

 **James:** i had a lot going on in may!  
studying, and family obligations.

 **Sirius:** What family obligations?

 **James:** and i redownloaded pokemon go.  
shut up sirius you don't know my life.

 **Sirius:** We literally live together, but go off I guess

 **Remus:** Go to gov.uk and register to vote NOW.  
Do it right now, I mean it.  
It takes five minutes.

 **James:** my pride's at stake here ffs remus.

 **Sirius:** The future of our nation hangs in the balance and this clown's throwing his vote away for the sake of self-gratification

 **James:** i have eu citizenship through mum.  
i'll be fine.

 **Remus:** And the rest of us can burn in the fires of Tory incompetence?  
Register to vote now or I swear I'll thump you.

 **Peter:** Wait  
Wait  
WAIT  
Clint Foxworthy was a PLANT????!

 **James:** yes peter THANK YOU for getting back to the matter at hand.  
we need to vote charles out of the party.

 **Peter:** Agreed.

 **Remus:** You need to vote period.

 **Sirius:** No to ousting Charles

 **James:** WHY??

 **Sirius:** Because he's a Healer  
We need a Healer  
Which we wouldn't if you hadn't bloody insisted upon becoming an Auror in the first place  
Two duelists in one party, we're such a fucking cliche

 **Remus:** Nowhere in this conversation do I see that you've registered to vote yet.

 **James:** i called auror first you incorrigible prick.  
don't put this on me.  
the only reason you don't want to kick charles out is because you think his borderline psychosis is hilarious.  
if he DID turn up at the house with a katana and try to kill us all you'd be well chuffed.

 **Sirius:** It'd be something interesting to do on a Friday night

 **James:** what if he murdered mum?

 **Sirius:** He wouldn't dare

 **James:** what if he did though?

 **Sirius:** Don't you dare say shit like that about my mother

 **James:** she's my ACTUAL mother!!!?!

 **Remus:** James, I'll vote Charles out if you register to vote and send me a screenshot.

 **James:** done.

 **Sirius:** Fuck you Remus

 **Remus:** We can find another Healer.  
He's right, too. Charles is certifiably unhinged.

 **Peter:** And only getting worse.

 **Sirius:** Eccentricity isn't a crime

 **Remus:** He has quit abruptly in the middle of a battle because he suddenly needed to masturbate.  
Twice.

 **Peter:** And both times he spelled it masterbate.

 **Sirius:** The misspelling was unforgivable, yeah  
But what man hasn't pulled off a quick one during a battle?

 **Remus:** Me.

 **Peter:** Me.

 **James:** right hang on, i'm on this website.  
just typing in my middle name.  
l  
a  
n  
c  
e

 **Sirius:** Lie all you want, if you want Charles out it has to be unanimous and it's not unanimous

 **James:** l  
o  
t  
ffs sirius he's mental.

 **Sirius:** Whatever, we need a Healer

 **James:** that's a bullshit reason you sock full of wank.

 **Sirius:** Maybe, but it's the only reason you're getting  
He stays

 **James:** you'll need a healer for real when he's prising your teeth from your skull and stringing them into a necklace.

 **Peter:** LOL, our duelists are dueling.

 **Sirius:** Now see what you've done, James?  
You've got Peter trying to make jokes again

*****

**From:** Peter Pettigrew (badboyzbadpete@yahoo.com)

 **To:** _WWW Gaming Group_ (carelesswhiska@gmail.com, rjlupin2001@gmail.com, fyodoraboutit@hotmail.com, charlesbarnabas@fernsbyestate.co.uk)

 **Date:** 20th June, 2019, 8:17 p.m.

 **Subject:** **FWD:** petition for the expulsion of jackedripper666 from the marauders alliance

====================

I officially vote YES

Get him out!

Yes to Chexit!

**\- - - - - - - - - - Forwarded Message - - - - - - - - - -**

From: **James Potter** (carelesswhiska@gmail.com)  
Date: 20th June, 2019 at 7:22 p.m.  
Subject: petition for the expulsion of jackedripper666 from the marauders alliance  
To: Sirius Black (fyodoraboutit@hotmail.com), Remus Lupin (rjlupin2001@gmail.com), Peter Pettigrew (badboyzbadpete@yahoo.com)

**Expand to see message content**


	2. Level 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I must preface this chapter by warning you that A) there is some pretty bad language in one scene and B) I had to research angry gamer guy rants for the sake of an authentic Charles Barnabas Fernsby and I really suffered for it. The internet is an absolute cesspit and men are dogs. The end.

James Potter was an adult man.

Legally.

Granted, in some ways he was less adult than others. He didn't need to shave his face as often as he would have liked, but he figured that Rome wasn't built in a day, and in terms of scale, his innate brilliance was pretty Rome-like.

He was a leader, a conjurer, possessing a maturity one would expect of an adult man several years his senior. He knew how to cook proper meals, had a full working knowledge of the menstrual cycle and knew to separate whites from colours when he did laundry. He had taken his cat for all of his shots like a responsible pet owner and was eligible to vote—which he intended to do, just as soon as his friend Remus told him if he should get behind Labour or the Lib Dems in… whatever the next election was.

All in all, he firmly believed that he was a functional grown-up.

James added to his list of accomplishments by registering himself as an official member of the Kensington and Chelsea electorate on a muggy June evening that had cloaked the city of London in a blanket of air as thick as it was humid. Once he finished and dropped his phone into his lap, it occurred to him—steady and mature as he was—that instead of wasting the rest of his night to a WhatsApp argument that would never arrive at a satisfactory conclusion, he could just chuck something at Sirius.

So he did.

His new trainers were lying handily within reach, and Sirius let out a cry of pain when one of them collided with his temple.

This victory, however, was incredibly short lived.

"James!" cried his mother, Euphemia, appearing in the living room doorway as if by magic, iced tea in hand, magnetically drawn towards the sound of her biological son's trainer bouncing off the side of her adopted son's head. "What did you do that for?!"

His mum was out of luck, because James felt no guilt. He was concerned for the wellbeing of his friends, while Sirius seemed hellbent on leading said friends into peril. The stupid prat had earned a projectile or two.

There might have been a _little_ guilt.

Maybe.

Almost.

A mere slither of guilt, sparingly cut from a much larger slice.

The problem was, he was often too soft with Sirius and his mate didn't half love taking advantage of that. James needed to keep a close eye on the guilt he consumed, lest he find himself stuffed with remorse and inclined to forgive his best mate for betraying the Marauders Alliance, of which he, James Potter, was leader.

So it was settled. Sirius deserved it.

If only the trainer had hit him on the shoulder instead of the head, he would have deserved it _more,_ but James's aim was simply too good. He could never be counted upon to miss a shot. The immense talent which had been bestowed upon him at birth was often more of a burden than a gift.

"Well?" said Euphemia, eyebrows raised.

James blinked and tried to look nonplussed, as though by way of a gravitational abnormality, a shift in the earth's plates or a gust of wind from one of the house's many open windows, his trainer had been levitated into the air against its will and propelled violently across the room.

"What was what for?" he said innocently.

"The bright red Adidas Original you just lobbed at my head?" Sirius offered, scowling and rubbing the spot above his ear.

The offending trainer lay on the carpet, as complicit in James's crime as he was.

"It lobbed itself at your head," James replied.

"Why are you throwing shoes at your brother?" Euphemia demanded. "More to the point, _why_ have you brought your filthy trainers onto my living room carpet in the first place?"

James gaped at her, aghast.

Filthy trainers!

Of _all_ the accusations!

He was offended. Those trainers were brand new and just out of the box, and Euphemia knew that because she was the one who'd bought them for him. James had only worn them once around the kitchen, and that was just to model them for the cat, who hadn't been remotely appreciative.

The insult rankled deep within his soul.

"They're clean," he retorted, calling upon his every last ounce of courage like a cultist attempting to summon Yog-Sothoth from a rift in the space-time continuum. His mother would end him if he was cheeky, but his honour had been impugned. It could not be borne. "Why is your carpet more important than his head?"

His mother's sharp brown eyes narrowed into slits.

This was it.

She would end him, very shortly.

It had been a good life, while it lasted. James had made it eighteen years in this world, but soon his face would be plastered all over the news while friends and distant relatives wept on camera and talked about how he'd been "full of life," and "lit up a room," and all the usual crap that no living person had ever been accused of. Being murdered by his own mother would get him a day of front-page coverage on all the major newspapers, so at the very least, he'd leave in a blaze of infamy. That was something.

"Sirius doesn't come at a cost of £49.99 per metre squared," said Euphemia coldly. Dangerously. "Why did you throw a shoe at your brother?"

"I didn't."

"Who did, then?"

 _I'm sorry!_ his brain shrieked. _I'm a good boy!_ His stupid mouth ignored it. "Ghosts."

"Our ghosts haunt the attic, not the living room. Try again."

"He threw it because we're in the middle of an argument," said Sirius.

"What argument?" Euphemia's gaze flicked from one son to the other. "Neither of you have uttered a word for the past hour."

"It all happens on their phones these days," said Fleamont, James's father, who was lounging on the slate grey sofa which sat between James and Sirius's recliners, squinting at his Kindle behind his glasses. "The Zolom's Children."

While Euphemia pulled a face at her husband, her dark, sculpted eyebrows drawing close together in consternation, James stared blankly at his dad.

"The Zolom's _what?"_ he repeated.

"Children," said Fleamont simply. "Generation Z." He glanced up, caught his son's eye and blinked, meeting James's bewildered face with its mirror image—same eyes, glasses, nose, cheekbones, uncontrollably disheveled hair—albeit less obviously handsome and a lot more worn by time. "Is that not the accepted terminology?"

"You're talking nonsense, darling," said Euphemia flatly.

"Was I?" Fleamont shrugged. "Silly me."

"I think your husband's in a cult, Euphemia," suggested Sirius.

"Or he's been at the whiskey." Euphemia stalked across the room to join her husband on the sofa, glaring at James the whole time. "Have you been at the whiskey?"

"No, my love. Not unless you splashed a bit in here," said Fleamont, indicating the cup of matcha green tea that he'd balanced on his thigh. Euphemia made him drink the tea twice-daily to maintain his virility and sexual stamina, and had discussed this dietary decision with James at length, presumably to traumatise him so thoroughly that he committed himself to lifelong celibacy, an ingenious method of suppressing his own sexual appetite that could only be conceived by Euphemia Potter, a woman as brilliant as she was dastardly.

As James had recently acquired a girlfriend and was very much hoping to have sex at some point before he died, this felt like an especially heinous development.

"My husband's in a cult and my son is a violent criminal," a now-seated Euphemia informed the ceiling, while Fleamont returned to his Kindle, completely unperturbed.

"Sirius called me a fucking pompous twat," James quickly put in.

"My mistake," said his mother. "A snitch _and_ a violent criminal."

"He wouldn't vote Charles out of the par—"

Sirius cut over him at once. "So you don't support democracy, do you?"

"Democracy!" James yelled, as amused by the accusation as he was appalled. He, Remus and Peter all wanted Charles out of the group. If Sirius truly supported democracy, that weirdo would be gone already. "The man keeps a framed photo of Ted Bundy in his kitchen! Killer of _multiple_ women, Ted Bundy!" he added, appealing directly to his mother, who in her tumultuous youth had been stalked by two rejected suitors, and took this kind of thing very seriously. "We saw it in a selfie he sent us on Discord last week, sitting right next to his bloody Brita filter."

"Why is a person who worships Ted Bundy sending you selfies?" Euphemia asked.

"Wanted to show us his new fedora," said Sirius, biting back a laugh.

"Call me crazy, but any person who wears fedoras and keeps framed photos of a murderous necrophile in their home isn't someone I want in my life," James finished, thankful to have a solid argument in the face of his mother's annoyance. He normally found himself with very little to go on. "Or in my friends' lives. Sirius might think he's funny _now—"_

"Not funny," said Sirius. "Hilarious."

"He'll be a lot less hilarious when you're found dead in a ditch somewhere."

"Why did you invite him into your party to begin with, if he's such a loon?" said Euphemia.

"Because," said James, "he seemed normal at the time."

"See, the truly accomplished internet weirdos release their crazy over time, in stages, so by the time you've realised they're a weirdo you're in way too deep to shake them off," Sirius explained. "That's what Charles did."

"Or he killed the original Charles and stole his identity."

"There's no real way of telling."

"Has this Charles person ever made threats against you or Sirius?" Euphemia asked her son.

James blanked for a full three seconds. "No, but—"

"Ever made you feel unsafe?"

"Not directly, but—"

"But you threw a shoe at your own brother's head," she reminded him, prompting an evil grin to split across Sirius's pale, annoyingly symmetrical face. "So tell me, James, which is the _bigger_ immediate threat to his safety?"

"I'm not—"

"You could have taken his eye out."

"I wouldn't have—"

"You could have given him a concussion."

"I could be seriously injured," Sirius pouted, his hand pressed to his temple like he was stemming the flow of blood from a garish flesh wound. "You monster."

Euphemia turned her head to examine him. "Are you seeing lights in front of your eyes? Do you feel dizzy? Are you in any pain?"

Sirius frowned. "No?"

"Then we don't need to call the coroner just yet," she concluded. "Ease up on the drama."

It should have been James's turn to smile evilly at Sirius, but his mother had already bestowed her displeasure back upon him.

"Pick up your trainer and apologise," she ordered.

His dumb, traitorous mouth couldn't help itself. "To the trainer?"

Euphemia picked up a turquoise cushion and threw it at him, but James, talented as he was, caught it one-handed before it hit his face, narrowly avoiding elbowing his glass of rapidly-warming Coke off the arm of his recliner. It was less comfortable than Sirius's recliner because the in-built massage function was broken, but his parents hadn't done a thing to get it repaired.

Clearly, nobody cared if James's muscles ached at the end of a long, hard day.

"It's too muggy and I'm too tired to parent you," his mother informed him, "so apologise to Sirius and put your trainers out on the shoe rack, or you'll get double the parenting tomorrow."

James wanted to protest that he was a grown man—a legal, responsible, mature adult who she had no right to parent—but his mother would only argue that he had to obey her rules for as long as he lived under her roof, and he was too lousy a liar to pretend that he disagreed with that logic.

He scowled at Sirius, who smiled pleasantly back.

Euphemia continued to watch him expectantly.

"Sorry," he muttered, teeth clamped together.

"I forgive you," said Sirius, maddeningly smug in victory. He leaned over the side of his recliner to scoop James's trainer up from the floor, and held it aloft, his deceptively angelic smile never faltering. "Please be a dear and put your trainers on the shoe rack."

He tossed the trainer in James's direction, clearly intending to injure. Just like with the cushion, James was forced to pull off an incredible, last-second save before it smacked him on the nose, but did anyone applaud his reflexes? No. His dad was engrossed in the biography of some bloke named Pasteur who nobody had ever heard of, while his mum had already hit play on the episode of _QI_ she'd paused, and was pressing her glass of iced tea to her forehead, expelling frustrated breaths from her pursed lips.

Which reminded James, the living room was stiflingly warm, but he had an oscillating fan all to himself upstairs. With a final scowl for everyone present, he stood up, shoved his phone into his jeans pocket, gathered both trainers and stalked away, ignoring Euphemia's shouted instruction to take his glass with him and put it in the dishwasher.

He would pay dearly for that, but James had been slighted. He had to leave _some_ token of his annoyance behind.

Once he'd dropped his trainers on the shoe rack and climbed the stairs—stepping gingerly around the cat, who loved to doze on the top step and get in the way, just to stick it to the family who loved him—James fled to the safety of his bedroom, where he was free from injustice, had some privacy, and the walls were painted in a violent shade of red that he regretted insisting upon when he was eleven. For a moment, he considered sitting at his desk and pulling out a sketch that he'd been working on before the A Levels consumed his free time like an unrelenting black hole, but decided that he was too hot and grouchy to bother.

Instead, he switched his fan on, flopped backwards onto his bed and pulled his phone out of his pocket, intending to give Remus a call. James had recently read an article online about how British men didn't speak to their male friends on the phone enough and how that contributed to...something very bad that he couldn't remember. He'd gotten distracted by his cat and never finished the article, but the point was, it was bad, and he wasn't going to contribute to it.

He also wanted to complain about how unreasonable Sirius was being.

Before he could unlock his phone and make the call, a text notification popped up, obscuring most of Algernon's furious-yet-photogenic glare.

_So bored at this stupid dinner my mum's a nightmare. What are you up to? Miss u xox_

James's face broke into a wide, goofy grin at once.

It amazed him, how quickly he could be cheered by a text from his girlfriend, even on this sweaty, disgusting day. Even though his best friend was such a huge fan of murderous sociopaths that he would invite one to infiltrate a most sacred circle of friends. Even though his mum was unfairly biased towards Sirius. Even though his dad was very possibly in a cult.

What was all of that compared to Georgia?

Fun, clever, gorgeous Georgia, his girlfriend of two months and counting. She was one of the most popular girls at school, and nearly half of the blokes in their year had fancied her at some time or another, but she had chosen James, even asked him out herself, and the girls James knew _never_ asked boys out. By the time the A Levels had come to an end, nearly all of their classmates knew that James Potter and Georgia Boleyn-Smythe were together, and there couldn't have been a better way to bring an end to his school career.

Picturing Georgia's coppery brown curls and adorably freckled nose clearly in his mind's eye, he settled comfortably against his headboard and began to compose a response which would perfectly encapsulate the horrifying evening he was having.

_i'm being cruelly victimised by my own parents while my so-called best friend furthers his plot to overthrow me and possibly have me killed, pls send help x_

Georgia's response was quick to arrive.

_Aww no! You ok? xxxxx_

_sirius won't kick crazy charles out of the gaming group because he thinks clinically criminal people are hilarious._

_Is that the board game group or the computer game group? xxx_

_our www group._  
_computer game._  
_this bloke is DERANGED, seriously._ _  
_ _keeps trying to invite us to 'summer in his lakeside cottage' in windermere._

_Whaaaaaat??! x_

_yeah like, just the four of us?_ _  
_ _he's like fifty he's got two kids he never sees but he wants to spend the summer with four 18 year old boys??????_

_Urgh that's disgusting, he's probs trying to groom you all or something, total creeper xxx_

_honestly i think he's legit dangerous._  
_but when i gently chided sirius for not taking our safety seriously he got me in trouble with my parents._ _  
_ _he just doesn't care._

_Sirius is so unfair to you sometimes x_

_i know!_

_Are you going to talk to your mum about him? xx_

_about charles? she already knows._

_No babe, about Sirius xox_

_why do i need to talk to her about sirius?_

_About the way he bullies you x_

This startling proclamation made James blink down at his phone, frowning, while an uncomfortable sensation of unease—the same feeling he got when he knew he was about to get caught misbehaving—settled heavily behind his ribs.

Bullied? Him?

And by _Sirius Black,_ of all people? Sirius, who knew all of his secrets and kept the ones that mattered close to his chest? Who went to every single one of James's football matches and cheered him on with gusto, even though he hated football with a passion? Who would have taken a knife to the heart for James, without question, if his life were ever in danger?

It was such an outlandish idea that James laughed out loud for want of a better reaction, and would have texted Georgia back to applaud her excellent joke, but a follow-up text came whizzing into the message thread almost as quickly as its predecessors.

_It's not fair you're being treated like that in your own house by your best friend after your family took him in, especially if he's making you look bad in front of your parents when you try to discuss a serious issue with him xxxxx_

So...she meant what she was saying.

But that was baseless.

 _i'm not being bullied,_ he started to type, then deleted it.

 _lol sirius would never,_ he tried again, but deleted that too.

James had to tread carefully here. Georgia's theory was balls-to-the-wall nonsense and he couldn't let her go about her life with such a low opinion of his best mate, but he didn't want to hurt her feelings by pointing that out. Sirius was a pot-stirrer of the highest order, everybody knew that, but that was no reason for Georgia to arrive at such an unfair conclusion so quickly.

He also didn't want to backtrack completely and make her think that he'd been exaggerating his woes for sympathy and attention, which he kind of had been, but now wasn't the time to get into that.

This was a communication issue, that was all. James and Georgia were still getting to know each other as a couple, so she wasn't used to his sense of humour yet. She also hadn't spent much time around Sirius at all—they'd never had any classes together, and Sirius hardly bothered to speak to anyone outside his own social circle. Georgia simply didn't get their dynamic, and that was totally fair. It would naturally take some time for them to integrate with one another's friends.

He was being so mature about this.

Wise, really.

He'd have to brag to Remus about his handling of the situation, as well as seeing about getting a reward for registering to vote, like a certificate of adulthood or something. He couldn't tell Sirius about his superior boyfriending skills—he'd only sit on his head and call him drippy twat.

Shifting on his bed to find a more comfortable position, James took one quick skim of their conversation and jotted out what he felt was a diplomatic response to what had come before.

_oh it's fine, he's my best mate and i can be shit to him too sometimes, it's just jokes mostly x_

Georgia started to type as soon as the message was read, and a reply popped up seconds later.

_It doesn't seem like jokes if he's upsetting you this much xxx_

Okay, so she hadn't gotten it. He'd try again.

_he hasn't really, i was just venting._

_You were venting bc you were upset and that's allowed x_

_i know, but sometimes i'm just dramatic like that, you don't need to take it seriously._

_Babe I know he's your best friend and I know you feel like you need to defend him but you don't have to do that with me, I won't tell xxx_

"You're not getting it," he muttered aloud, and immediately felt guilty—for talking back to his non-present girlfriend _and_ for his nervy irritation. He caught his tongue between his teeth and started to type, but what might have become a long and impassioned—yet still polite and delightful—defence of his best friend was brought to a halt by the arrival of the man himself. Sirius burst into the room like he was running a SWAT bust, grinning like a maniacal arsehole, and pointed one long, slender finger in his best friend's direction.

"Oddjob!" he bellowed. "Hah!"

James dropped his phone on his duvet, groaned like he was dying and grabbed a pillow to smother his face and make that dream a reality, cursing himself to hell for daring to piss his mother off.

He should have put his glass in the bloody dishwasher.

*****

**WhatsApp Group:** Rogelio my Brogelio

 **Members:** Lily Evans, Bonnie Grogan, Mary Macdonald

 **Chat Resumed:** 20th June, 2019, 9:46 p.m.

====================

 **Lily:** Do you think I'm having an existential crisis?  
Not to completely embody the stereotype of an overdramatic teenager.  
Overdramatic adult, I guess.  
I don't know.  
Look whatever it's a legitimate question.

 **Mary:** No.

 **Bonnie:** ^

 **Lily:** Oh great, guess I'm cured of my troubling ennui now, thanks.  
Do either of you want to elaborate on that?

 **Mary:** You're not having a crisis, you're tired.

 **Bonnie:** I think you're just tired.  
Hahaha, snap.

 **Mary:** JINX!  
You can't talk again until you buy me a present.

 **Lily:** Noooooooo un-jinx her, I need her help.

 **Mary:** And mine's not good enough?

 **Lily:** You're not taking me seriously.  
How can I be tired if I can't bloody sleep?

 **Mary:** Because, welcome to adulthood, where being tired and unable to sleep will define your life until you finally die and rest eternal in your maggotty grave.

 **Lily:** Deep.

 **Mary:** Like your grave.

 **Lily:** Love your sunny optimism.

 **Mary:** It's an overcast realism, and it gets results.

 **Lily:** Bonnieeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!!  
Help meeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 **Mary:** She can talk she's JINXED.

 **Lily:** She can't be jinxed we're EIGHTEEN.

 **Mary:** Shut yer puss, fannybaws.

 **Lily:** Oh well done, looking up Scottish insults on Buzzfeed again.

 **Mary:** They're the insults of my people.

 **Lily:** You absolute bollocks, Macdonald.

 **Mary:** You utter shitehawk, Evans.

 **Lily:** You're a fart lozenge.

 **Mary:** You're a melted welly.

 **Lily:** You are Tom Selleck's moustache.

 **Mary:** LMFAO  
Not Scottish but fine you win.

 **Lily:** _@Bonnie Grogan_ are you seriously not going to talk just because she jinxed you?

 **Bonnie:** Sorry! I'm in a restaurant and mam's demanding that I periodically interact with the rest of the table.  
Everyone eats super late over here.  
What's got you down babe?

 **Mary:** She's tired.

 **Lily:** My brain has been wrung out like a dishcloth I can't focus on anything I'm pissed off I haven't done anything I'd planned on doing this summer my head is empty and I've done nothing but watch Netflix.

 **Mary:** Commas, babe.

 **Lily:** So no, I'm not tired, I'm spiralling.

 **Mary:** You're burned out.  
This is totally normal.

 **Bonnie:** Yeah honestly babe I think Mary's right.  
You worked your arse off for the A Levels.  
Like, Twin Peaks levels of working your arse off. Nonsensical levels that I cannot understand.

 **Mary:** You're obsessed with that fucking show omg.

 **Bonnie:** BECAUSE IT MAKES NO FUCKING SENSEEEEEEEEEE  
THAT RANDOM BOX IN NEW YORK BASICALLY ATE PEOPLE AND I'M NOT SUPPOSED TO CARE????

 **Mary:** Moving past Bonnie's existential crisis

 **Bonnie:** AND WHO THE FUCK IS BILLY??????

 **Mary:** She's right, who takes FIVE subjects at A Level?  
Four is already pushing it.  
Stop talking about Twin Peaks, Lily's (not) having a crisis.

 **Lily:** I am having a crisis.

 **Mary:** It was inevitable that you'd crash out once you were done and you've only been done for a week.  
I crash out that hard after plucking my eyebrows.  
Just relax FFS.

 **Bonnie:** I'm just SAYING I hate that show and it's stupid.  
And Mary's right, give yourself some time to decompress.

 **Lily:** Spi-rall-ing.  
I'm not even watching new Netflix stuff.  
Just the same crap I've watched before.

 **Bonnie:** Well good, you've earned the right to spend a few weeks doing nothing.

 **Lily:** And yes, I worked my arse off for these exams. I gave up weekends. I took too many subjects. I SCHEDULED my anxiety attacks so they wouldn't get in the way of my revision plan. I was nuts and I KNOW that I was nuts, but I'd made my peace with it.

 **Mary:** Oh, babe.  
Scheduling anxiety attacks???!

 **Bonnie:** I'm starting to see where it all went wrong for you tbh.

 **Lily:** And WHY did I do all of that? So I can go to uni and do it all over AGAIN until I have a masters in something that I'll realise halfway through I hate, but by then I'll be too far gone to stop so I'll just keep going and end up stuck in a job I can't stand for the rest of my life??  
What even is the point of doing ANYTHING?

 **Mary:** Oh my god.  
Take a shower and ask Holland to go to the cinema tomorrow.  
Go see Toy Story 4.  
Have a cry.  
Give him a handy in the back of the cinema.  
Sorted.

 **Lily:** WTF NO  
GOD  
MARY  
WHAT  
WHY

 **Mary:** LMFAO

 **Bonnie:** Twin Peaks was going too far but public sex acts are on the table?

 **Mary:** LOLOLOLOLOLOLOL

 **Lily:** Right, yeah.  
I'll just casually give him a handjob in the back of the cinema full of kids while I'm lamenting the loss of a childhood I didn't appreciate when I had the chance, that'll definitely be conducive to a mature and respectful relationship.

 **Mary:** Woody's lucky he didn't go to uni with Andy.  
Imagine how he'd feel watching Andy experiment with sex and drugs.

 **Bonnie:** What the actual fuck Mary.

 **Mary:** Sitting on the shelf while Andy goes to town on some hot piece's genitals.  
Male or female, don't want to assume his sexuality.

 **Bonnie:** STOP.

 **Mary:** Eyes frozen open.  
Unable to look anywhere else.

 **Lily:** STOP.

 **Mary:** Listening to Andy cry out "YEE HAW!" when he finishes.

 **Lily:** Wow.

 **Bonnie:** You're a sociopath.

 **Mary:** LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL

 **Bonnie:** I'm washing my eyes with bleach as soon as I get back to the hotel.

 **Lily:** I'm taking the less dangerous option and turning my phone off.

 **Mary:** Noooooooooooooo don't!  
I can give you a ring in a few minutes and switch to serious Mary mode, I promise.  
I'm here to help you through your existential crisis.  
I'm literally walking back to the room right this minute.

 **Lily:** FINE, you can ring me but ONLY because I'm desperate and Bonnie's being held hostage by her parents.  
But I am NOT giving Liam Holland a handjob.

 **Mary:** URGH, why would you even suggest that?  
Jesus Christ, Lily.  
Have some fucking decorum, please.

*****

**Discord Server:** WWW Marauders Alliance

 **Created by:** Ah-Idk

 **Members:** Ah-Idk, siriusblack, Bacon4Algernon, JackedRipper666, LaydeesMan2000

 **Resumed:** 21st June, 2019, 11:31 a.m.

====================

 **JackedRipper666:** I see your true faces now.

 **Bacon4Algernon:** what??

 **siriusblack:** HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

 **JackedRipper666:** You can read, can't you?

 **Bacon4Algernon:** yeah but...idk what you're talking about??

 **siriusblack:** HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

 **Bacon4Algernon:** wtf sirius stop laughing.  
what have you done?

 **JackedRipper666:** Don't put this on Sirius. This was YOUR doing.  
You think you can toy with us and avoid all consequences.

 **Bacon4Algernon:** seriously charles i have no fucking idea what's going on.

 **JackedRipper666:** You think you can sit up there in your ivory tower and play god.

 **Bacon4Algernon:**??????????  
wtf even is an ivory tower my bedroom is red.

 **JackedRipper666:** You think you can treat your friends like shit and get away with it, but you're not getting away with it this time.

 **Bacon4Algernon:** ?????!!!!

 **siriusblack:** Check your emails you fucking idiot

 **Bacon4Algernon:** why??

 **siriusblack:** Because Peter forwarded yours to his stupid distribution group last night instead of replying to it

_Several people are typing_

**JackedRipper666:** Are you that much of a coward that you let your little sycophant do your dirty work for you?

 **siriusblack:** LOLLLLLLLLL  
#Chexit

 **JackedRipper666:** Did he stop sucking your cock long enough to forward on your email 'by accident'?

 **Bacon4Algernon:** fuuuuuuuuck charles i'm so sorry!!!  
wtf NO, what is WRONG with you???

 **JackedRipper666:** What's WRONG with me???  
My dearest friends in the world choose to inform me that I am being kicked out of the group with a feeble quip?  
Once that makes light of a serious political event that I have campaigned for for years?  
That you KNOW means a lot to me?  
THAT'S WHAT'S FUCKING WRONG.

 **Ah-Idk:** Funny, because the rest of us were against it and that never stopped you from laughing at us and calling us Remoaners and telling us to suck it up and deal with it.

 **Bacon4Algernon:** no remus it's fine, this is my fault.  
seriously charles, i'm so so so so sorry.  
and look, i don't think the five of us are a good fit for a group, i'm not going to lie and pretend that it was some joke because it wasn't, but it wasn't fair on you that you found out this way.  
i feel like an arsehole and i should feel like an arsehole and i'm so sorry, honestly, that email was really shitty and i shouldn't have sent it.

 **Ah-Idk:** You don't have to say sorry.

 **siriusblack:** Don't pretend you're sorry  
It was a good stealth move on Peter's part

 **LaydeesMan2000:** No! No it wasn't! No stealth move!!!  
It was a mistake!!!  
I'm sorry James!! I wasn't thinking and typed in the group name out of habit I'm so sorry!!!!

 **siriusblack:** Alternatively, it was act of total fucking stupidity  
It's beyond pathetic that I believe you

 **JackedRipper666:** So you'll apologise to James for forwarding his disgusting piece of shit email, Peter, but you won't apologise to me?

 **Ah-Idk:** You think Peter should apologise to you when you literally just called him a sycophant?

 **LaydeesMan2000:** And a cocksucker!

 **Ah-Idk:** Objectively, there's nothing wrong with sucking cocks if that's what you want to do. Sycophant is a worse insult.  
Charles, why would you ever think that we're your dearest friends in the world after the way you've treated us?

 **JackedRipper666:** The way I've treated all of YOU?  
Are you fucking SERIOUS???? THE WAY I'VE TREATED YOU FUCKING PUSSYS?

 **siriusblack:** It's *pussies

 **JackedRipper666:** I can't fucking believe this.  
I can't believe it!!  
After EVERYTHING I've done for the four of you and all the times I've saved your incompetent asses, you'd toss me on the fucking scrapheap like a dying cat??

 **Ah-Idk:** I don't think any of us would throw a dying cat on top of a scrapheap.

 **Bacon4Algernon:** see?? SEE??????  
this is what he does to cats and you want to keep him IN, sirius???

 **JackedRipper666:** Have you all forgotten how I saved you from that hag?  
All four of you would have died in the Hog's Head if it weren't for MY Bezoars!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 **Ah-Idk:** Bezoars you stole from the hag who then poisoned us to get revenge.  
You've got a nice little habit of putting the party in danger so you can be the one to save us from it, don't you?

 **siriusblack:** HAHAHAHAHAHAHA  
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

 **JackedRipper666:** EXCUSE ME?  
So I suppose you've just been pretending to like me for the past year, just like James?

 **Ah-Idk:** We did like you at first, when you were pretending to be different, but this has been a long time coming and I'm not going to waste my time apologising.  
You're constantly leaving in the middle of battles we've planned in advance, you're forever coming into the chat just to take your bad moods out on us, you've bragged about avoiding weekends with your children so you could play with us instead, and you've said disgusting things to the girls we've met on the game. To be completely honest, we've been patient with you and let you away with being a prick for too long.  
You can't spend a year treating people like garbage, then act offended when some of them don't want you around.

 **JackedRipper666:** Well FUCK YOU!!!  
Fucking cocksucking queers!!!!  
The only reason I joined this fucking group in the first place is because you were helpless without me and I felt sorry for you, see how well you do without me you fucking arseholes!!!!!!!!

 **siriusblack:** Wait, Charles, don't leave us!!!!  
I campaigned tirelessly against your expulsion while the rest of them wanted you gone

 **JackedRipper666:** Go fuck yourself Sirius, fucking long haired twat

 **siriusblack:** No, seriously, you're a prime Healer, why would I want to kick you out?  
James was the one jonesing to boot you  
He manipulated Peter  
Bribed Remus with promises he couldn't keep

 **Bacon4Algernon:** couldn't keep?? i LITERALLY registered to vote last night!

 **siriusblack:** I alone stood up for you  
I was the only one who argued for your side  
And quite frankly I think it's a travesty that James could treat you like this after you've given us a year of your life  
Fuck the haters  
I see your value, mate

 **JackedRipper666:** That means a lot, but you couldn't pay me to stay in this piece of shit group of pussys now.  
If you ever want to leave the party and join me as I continue on my quest, you will be gladly welcomed, but the rest of these cocksuckers are as good as dead to me

 **siriusblack:** Wow, do you really mean that? Form our own party together? Just the two of us?

 **JackedRipper666:** Yes, of course I do. You're a better Auror than James anyway.  
Fuck ALL of you, Sirius and I will have our own party and we'll come and kill all three of you.

 **siriusblack:** HAHAHAHAHAHA  
Yeah, not a fucking chance, Norman Bates

 **JackedRipper666:** FUCK YOU THEN  
YOU KNOW WHAT?  
FUCK ALL OF YOU FUCKING COCKSUCKERS  
I KNOW WHERE YOU ALL FUCKING LIVE, I'M GONNA FIND YOU AND CHOP YOUR FUCKING HEADS OFF AND I'M GONNA PISS ON YOUR FUCKING GRAVES

 **siriusblack:** lol

_Ah-Idk has removed JackedRipper666 from the server_

**Bacon4Algernon:** well

 **LaydeesMan2000:** Wow.

 **Bacon4Algernon:** that was intense

 **siriusblack:** Fucking great work Peter

 **LaydeesMan2000:** I'm SORRY, but he wasn't mentally stable and it's better that he's gone!

 **siriusblack:** Yeah, I KNOW he wasn't stable  
That's why I reckoned it was better to keep him sweet

 **Ah-Idk:** You started laughing openly at him the moment he messaged us.  
You compared him to a psychopath. In what way was that supposed to keep him sweet?

 **siriusblack:** I didn't compare him to a psychopath

 **Ah-Idk:** You likened him to the literal psycho from the movie Psycho.

 **siriusblack:** The damage had already been done by then, that's not my fault  
Now the party's down a Healer and James is gonna get murdered just because Peter doesn't know how to hit reply all to a fucking email  
What is he a fucking baby boomer?

 **Bacon4Algernon:** don't have a go at peter when this is your fault.

 **siriusblack:** LOL how is it my fault??

 **Bacon4Algernon:** if you'd just accepted that we were 3 against 1 and expelled charles from the group we could have come up with an excuse to get rid of him.  
he wouldn't have needed to find out like this.

 **siriusblack:** If you'd just respected democracy we wouldn't be down a Healer right now

 **Bacon4Algernon:** the greeks INVENTED democracy you colonising shit.

 **siriusblack:** You're only half Greek

 **Bacon4Algernon:** you're only half turd.

 **Ah-Idk:** Sirius, the majority rules in a democracy.

 **siriusblack:** Oh, does it?  
Gee whizz

 **Ah-Idk:** You knew that already, I know you did.  
You've read more Chomsky than the scholars who specialise in Chomsky.

 **Bacon4Algernon:** wtf is chomsky?

 **LaydeesMan2000:** It's that chocolate bar everyone leaves behind in the selection box at Xmas.

 **siriusblack:** That's a Chomp you ignorant slut

*****

It wasn't a very hot day, exactly, but the air was damp and sticky, clinging like a second layer of skin, and the fan in Lily Evans's room was broken.

Her bedsheet was twisting and bunching in a sweaty bundle beneath her, and she couldn't drift off to sleep.

She shouldn't have been trying to sleep in the first place. It was the middle of the day, and the sun outside her window was shining brightly, but her best friends were both on vacation with their parents, her evil older sister was waist-deep in wedding-planning fright mode—truly the Lady Tremaine of brides—Lily had recently fallen foul of a mentally crippling apathy and her entire sense of purpose appeared to have gone limp.

"Some fun, productive summer I'm having," she muttered to herself. "Lying in a puddle of my own grossness like a bloody wounded snot."

She turned her head slightly and glanced over the books that were stacked in a pile on her bedside table, next to her glass of water and dangerously close to the ring of condensation that looped around the base. One of her goals for the summer was to reread all of her favourite old classics, but with her brain feeling like a lump of wet bread, she hadn't so much as turned a single page. Josephine March and Elizabeth Bennet were, for the moment, being left to their own devices.

Her beloved fictional heroines deserved so much better than to be left to their own devices. They deserved to be read and remembered and adored.

Lily sighed.

She closed her eyes and tried to squeeze away the daylight, as if her body might get sick of her brain's whinging and fall asleep on the spot.

No such luck.

Clearly, she needed to get her own shit together.

When she opened her eyes again, she let out an impatient breath and reminded herself that she was not a lazy wanker, but nothing else happened to rouse her. No sudden flash of inspiration came whizzing into her brain. No fairy godmother sailed in through her open bedroom window to wave her glittering magic wand and bring an end to Lily's unending lethargy.

Mary had spent a good hour on the phone with her the night before, arguing that Lily's sudden slump was nothing more than a bout of post-exam exhaustion, brought on by the (admittedly excessive) studying to which Lily had slavishly devoted herself for the better part of a year and which, perhaps, she was naturally clever enough to have done less of. The ease with which she had breezed through her A Levels had practically left her breathless, because she had overprepared, and though that should have given her an immense sense of pride, she merely felt as if she had been robbed of some sort of struggle, as if she had worked and stressed and sacrificed for nothing much at all.

Lily knew that Mary was right, but she never liked to admit that she was wrong, even when there was nobody there to hear it but herself. She knew that her emotional downturn was a total non-issue. She knew that she had classmates who would have killed for the exam experience she'd had. From any conceivable standpoint, it was clear that she was looking at things all wrong and needed to pull her head out of her arse.

Her entire first week of summer made for the perfect embodiment of a first world problem, but Lily felt how she felt, and she didn't know how to keep from feeling it.

She shuffled restlessly on the bed, lazily using the mattress to scratch her itchy back, and rolled over onto one side. Immediately, her eyes fell on the pretty cluster of yellow roses which comprised her computer's desktop background, and she sighed again, because she'd turned it on that morning in the hopes of getting some writing done.

Predictably, she hadn't written a word.

She could try to write something now, she supposed. She could sit at her desk, close her eyes, and hammer the keyboard aimlessly with her fists until something resembling anything came from the mess.

Or, she thought, her gaze flitting to a familiar desktop icon, she could always...

No.

_No._

She'd be an idiot if she even considered going down that road.

That account was deleted. Gone. And for very good reason. _Principled_ reasons.

Lily had sworn to herself that she'd never play that game again, and she hadn't. Not for over a year. Not since the Incident, and she reminded herself in that moment that logging back on would be five steps backwards when she should have been taking ten in the opposite direction.

Even if her exams were over now, and she technically had the time. Time was not the issue.

It was all a moot point anyway. DumbleD Games had been useless when she complained to them. They hadn't done shit to block Sev's IP or ensure that Lily would be safe whilst playing, so she wouldn't be able to reactivate her old account to reclaim her items and achievements, and besides all of that, she…

Quite fancied playing it.

 _Really_ fancied playing it, actually.

And that was...beyond inconvenient.

It was the first thing she'd fancied in over a week, really, aside from Liam Holland, and fancying Liam Holland was more of a full-time job than a fleeting impulse. This was a different kind of stirring, one that made the idea of engaging her brain in a task seem like less of a chore and more of something that might wake her up for the first time in a week.

 _Wizarding World Wars_ had been so much fun, when it hadn't been a nightmare, when she wasn't being harassed by sexually frustrated gamer boys and had a nice group of girls to play with. Before Severus had scared the shit out of her in his appalling attempt at a romantic gesture.

An hour or two couldn't _hurt,_ surely?

She could try it, at the very least, just to get back up to speed and see if much had changed in a year. She'd paid for the base game years ago, so she could easily create another account without spending any money. A new account would mean a new username, a new avatar and new aspirations. She could get a new wand—she'd always felt like she'd flubbed her questions with her first account, and silver lime had never seemed like the right wood for her. She could choose to be a Healer this time around, and challenge herself a little more. She'd been an Auror before, but nearly half of the game-playing community comprised of Aurors. They were ten-a-penny now, and an utterly banal choice.

Lily pushed herself up and swung her legs over the side of her bed, the heels of her hands pressed into her sweaty bedsheet.

Oh, screw it.

She'd be an idiot, then, and give in to her baser instincts.

She'd play _Wizarding World Wars_ for an hour.

 _Only_ an hour.

Or...two at most, because she'd need some extra time to pick a new username and design her character and get all of that squared away before she could start playing for real. Once she'd kick-started her brain into gear again, she could move on to more worthwhile, productive tasks. She could go to the swimming pool at the gym. She could start dividing her room into things she wanted to donate and things she was bringing to uni. She could lavish Josephine March and Lizzie Bennet with the attention they so richly deserved.

Until then, they could help her out with one or two things.

Lily's old avatar had been a digital replication of Lily herself: green eyed, red-haired, pale and freckled and girlishly dressed, while her username, DoeReyMe, had been inspired by her favourite _Star Wars_ character. Her new one had to be its polar opposite to keep Severus Snape at bay, so after she dragged herself off her bed and sat down in front of her computer, she set about experimenting with different names and styles, and JosieBenn—short, of course, for Josephine Bennet—was ready to go within fifteen minutes.

Where Rey had been a plucky Auror with hidden weapons at her disposal, Josie was industrious trainee Healer with electric blue hair and eyes, a swirl of tattoos on her arms and an owl perched upon her shoulder, rather than the cat preferred by her predecessor. She wore flat black boots and a black tank top and a dark red, scruffy leather jacket, very different to Rey's colourful, flowing gowns. Her wand was made of willow and phoenix feather, which overall felt like a much better fit for Lily than the last one she'd been given.

Finally, the sorting quiz placed her in Gryffindor, which _was_ DoeReyMe's old house, but as she shared that house with roughly a quarter of 8 million players, that seemed like less of an issue.

Josephine Bennet was nothing like DoeReyMe.

Nothing, in short, like anything Severus Snape might recall of the Lily Evans who had been foolish enough to befriend him in the months before the Incident. If he _was_ still lurking in the game like a bad smell, silently sniffing the air for a whiff of her reappearance, he would have no reason to suspect that Lily had come back at all.

Josie could be whoever Lily wanted her to be, and that was rather freeing, in a sense, for a girl who often felt so tightly squeezed by self-imposed pressure that she might have longed for a chance to reinvent herself.

She needed a bit of fun, that was all.

She wouldn't become obsessed. Not again.

This was fine.

Definitely, one hundred percent fine.

"Alright then, Josie B," Lily murmured under her breath, and moved her cursor above the button which read _Start_. "Let's ruin my summer together."


End file.
